Hell May Never Freeze
by DekotaSkye
Summary: John and Aeryn faces some realities.


Hell May Never Freeze  
  
By: DekotaSkye  
  
DISCLAIMER: I don't own the characters, the Jim Henson Company does, and...whoever else. I'm just using the characters for a moment in fun and entertainment. No real spoilers. Sometime in 5th season. I give all the credit to a great Beta Ixchup for all her corrections and for bountiful help to expressing my thoughts better. Rated: PG  
  
Aeryn hesitated for a moment in the doorway. John lay in a bed, eyes closed. His chest was bare and a golden cover was pulled up to his waist. His right shoulder and down his arm to his elbow, which disappeared under the covers, were swathed in bandages. Once more she faced a Crichton playing the hero at a high price possibly his life.  
  
She waited silently as the old woman passed her by with a slight nod. It would appear Granny had gotten it right by not saying anything to Aeryn. Pain and anger were too close to the surface.  
  
"Hey."  
  
He opened his eyes. "Hey," his voice was gruff.  
  
"How are you feeling?" She asked lightly, as she moved closer to his bed.  
  
John gave her an inscrutable look. She noted his eyes turned a startling deep blue and she knew he was angry.  
  
"We need to talk?"  
  
"Oh, about what?"  
  
"Your suicidal tendencies."  
  
She blinked. Opening her lips, she snapped them closed, not sure what to say. She blinked again. Finally she managed to get out, "My what?"  
  
"You heard me."  
  
She stood at the foot of his bed in total shock.  
  
He continued, "First, you try to solve the Hokathain thing yourself after you came back home with Scorpy in tow, even while dying with heat-delirium, and now this retrieval and rescue. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why you are always trying to be superwoman. You've got to let the guilt go."  
  
Frowning, Aeryn moved to the side of his bed. "Superwoman...guilt...what the hezmana are you talking about?"  
  
Staring intently at her, his gaze cut straight into her soul. She was amazed how he could always do that to her. "You're right. I do seem to like to play the frelling hero role."  
  
Shocked she wasn't expecting that admission coming from him. "Your point being?"  
  
"You're doing the same thing because you are afraid of loss and being left alone," he said. "You've got to stop this urge to protect me and feel you have to save me all the time. I'm a big boy now...you have taught me well to take care of myself. I don't have a death wish. I'm not going to leave you and our child anytime soon."  
  
"That's what the other John said while he was..."  
  
He cut her off by waving his good arm. "I'm not him, Aeryn. How many times do I have to tell you that?" Sighing, he let his arm drop. "If we're going to have a stronger relationship, you've got to let that fear go."  
  
She stared at him in silence. He was right she admitted to herself. She did feel guilty for not being there when the other John had to face Furlow alone. She still couldn't stop bashing about over the fact that she hadn't been fast enough to help John close the frelling door of Jack's displacement device and thus avoid the deadly radiation. In not being there she felt she somehow precipitated in the events that followed. John had to be the farhbot hero and seal the leak and then fly to his death without seeking out help after being exposed to that radiation. If only. If only. Aeryn realized she couldn't go back to change the past so she went forward, with the memories and guilt. Never again would she be faced with the possibility of being left alone without John. She would do whatever it took to keep him safe and alive.  
  
She proposed to him. "If you can stop playing the hero for the universe and start thinking about your family, I'll leave all the memories and guilt behind."  
  
Closing his eyes wearily, he muttered, "You are in the forefront of my mind every time I have to be separated from you and our daughter. I am not trying to play the hero."  
  
She laid her cool hand on his forehead and gently smoothed back his hair. "John, if that was totally true you wouldn't be lying here hurt."  
  
Opening his eyes, he frowned up at her. "Explain."  
  
"You may not wish to die but you have a way of going directly into a highly volatile situation with one of your plans that barely ever works. Why do you feel you've got to be the one to play point man, to lead the way all the time?"  
  
He shrugged his shoulders causing him to gasp in pain. She waited until the white line around his lips disappeared before she continued.  
  
"Did you not tell me, you pointedly told Einstein that you are no one's poppet? Yet you are doing whatever it takes to destroy any chances for the Peacekeepers or Scarrans from developing this wormhole technology. Does that not sound like a man doing what they want you to do?"  
  
He reeled back, staring at her, a stunned expression in his eyes.  
  
She plowed on. He'd given it to her straight and now it was his turn to face reality. "Are you still John Crichton, the human I fell in love with? Or are you the warrior hero for Einstein's people?"  
  
"I'm the human you fell in love with," he stated firmly.  
  
She replied gently, "Then stop feeling guilty and the strong need to save the universe from its self."  
  
His gaze slid away, and he went very still. He'd gone to a place inside himself where she couldn't fellow him. She hated to have to make him face what he so desperately wanted to avoid seeing. After a long period of time, his gaze finally turned back to her, clear, calm and completely unnerving.  
  
"I am responsible for thousands of deaths because of this curse that has been blessed on me," he said in a dead voice. "I can't let those deaths be in vain by not trying too."  
  
Swallowing her anger, she managed to say in a calm voice. "Then how can you accuse me of having suicidal tendencies? I have shared those death responsibilities with you as have D'Argo, Chiana, Rygel, Pilot..."  
  
"NO!" He shouted as he forced himself to sit up. Aeryn grabbed him by his good arm to keep him from falling backward, as he grimaced in pain. In a calmer voice he said, "You're not responsible. None of you are. I dragged all your ass into this sordid mess, like my twin did."  
  
Pain and guilt shot through her as she remembered her own past actions that lead to so much pain and misery. "You didn't drag...he didn't drag us into anything we didn't want to do."  
  
John took Aeryn's hand into his good one and lifted it to his lips. "I will try not to be the hero all the time if you stop pulling foolish stunts like this again."  
  
Reaching down she kissed him on the lips and murmured, "I guess that will only happen when your earth's hell freezes over."  
  
"Yeah, then I guess the devil and Scorpy will have a few more warm days ahead," he said before returning her kiss.  
  
Finis 


End file.
